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The Microsoft HoloLens Developer Kit originally released back in March of 2016. That’s nearly two and a half years ago. At that time it’s limited field of view of only 30 degrees horizontally was seen as a frustrating, but understandable, drawback. Now the Magic Leap One, the severely hyped upcoming AR headset that no one can talk about, only has a 40 degree horizontal field of view according to uncovered developer documentation.

There’s no other way to describe that than as a disappointment.

Source: VentureBeat

In a world where the upcoming Leap Motion North Star headset reportedly has a 100-degree FOV and Magic Leap’s received over $2 billion in funding by comparison, 40 degrees horizontally isn’t much of a “leap” forward at all.

Similar to the HoloLens, using the Magic Leap One will likely instill a “window” effect in your view. Instead of feeling like you’re surrounded by a magical, augmented world such as is shown in all of the promotional videos for the device, it’s more like peering through a tiny window to another world — almost like holding up your phone with Apple’s ARKit or Google’s ARCore.

Granted, I have not personally tried the Magic Leap One, but this statistic is troubling. When you combine this number with the lack of a real, live demo and an incredibly lackluster “rock monster” presentation that doesn’t even feature hand occlusion, it’s all adding up to what will likely be a major disappointment.

Source: Next Reality

The verdict is still out though and we have to wait a bit longer before delivering any real impressions, but our excitement is quickly dwindling. Magic Leap One will start shipping developer kits this summer.

The first talks have been revealed and registration is now open for Oculus Connect 5, being hosted September 26 and 27 in San Jose, California.

The first 18 talks revealed for the two-day event cover a variety of subjects, including porting content to the upcoming high-end standalone headset Facebook is seeding to developers this year.

The talk by Gabor Szauer, an Oculus Developer Relations Engineer, is titled “Porting Your App to Project Santa Cruz” and covers how to bring content to the forthcoming standalone system. The talk will cover “a stable of universal techniques and best practices can help reduce draw calls and hit perf without sacrificing fidelity. We’ll start with an overview of the device and basic considerations, and walk step by step through the process of reviewing and optimizing textures, scene geometry, and lighting. This session will also include a deep dive on engine profiling tools and specific Santa Cruz performance targets.”

This looks like the deep dive developers will be hoping to see about the capabilities of the “Santa Cruz” developer prototype. It is unknown right now exactly how hard it will be for developers to get versions of their PC-based Rift games up and running on the headset and this talk looks like it might answer some of those questions.

Oculus Connect 5: I will be doing me my usual live app reviews and unscripted keynote on day 2. https://t.co/zOTpbnn6cE

— John Carmack (@ID_AA_Carmack) July 31, 2018

Here are the other talks Oculus revealed:

Advances in the Oculus Rift PC SDK
Volga Aksoy, Oculus Software Engineer + Dean Beeler, Oculus Software Engineer
The PC SDK is the foundation of performance apps and games. This session will cover our latest features and new runtime advances designed to help you boost visual fidelity and performance.

Blood, Sweat, and Tears: A Tale of VR Esports
Christopher K. McKelvy, Oculus Head of Esports
Catch up on the latest and what’s next for Oculus’s journey into VR esports. During this talk, developers and business leaders will learn what makes a great VR esports title and how to capitalize on industry trends. Attendees will leave with a deep understanding of Oculus’ long-term strategy to revolutionize every aspect of esports including gameplay, competition, and viewership.

Bootstrapping Social VR
John Bartkiw, Oculus Platform Engineering Manager
The best way to get the real feeling of presence in VR is to share an experience with someone else. In this session, we’ll debunk the myth of how challenging it is to build a multiplayer VR experience. We’ll walk through a Unity sample project step-by-step to help you build with invites and matchmaking, co-ordinated app launch and Avatars, VoIP, and P2P networking.

Building Brand + Community (On a Budget)
Lisa Brown Jaloza, Oculus Tech Comms Manager
Come learn about the unique opportunities available to you as Oculus developers and pick up some tried-and-true best practices while you’re at it. From blogs and asset creation to reddiquette and beyond, we’ll help you put social media and the VR community to work for you—without breaking

Gaming is more open than ever, and that’s an amazing thing. Slowly but surely we’re seeing a much more diverse, vibrant industry emerge, one that thrives on the joys of our differences but also one that isn’t afraid to tackle tough subjects that we all face, like mental health. Some games, like this week’s stunning VR port of Hellblade, navigate this tricky territory with aplomb. Anamorphine, though, isn’t able to tackle it with the same eloquence.

Developer Artifact 5 is clearly speaking from the heart with this distressing tale of a couple that succumbs to depression following a tragic accident. And, through striking imagery and inventive design, the team does find some interesting ways to talk about these struggles. But a handful of missteps leave Anamorphine feeling cold, misguided and ultimately even a little irresponsible.

Other than movement and gaze-based interactions you’re simply a spectator in Anamorphine. You follow protagonist Tyler and his wife Elena as they struggle to come to terms with an incident that leaves the latter unable to play her cello, clearly a strong source of her livelihood. There isn’t a single spoken word; you move through Tyler’s increasingly distorted memories on what very much feels like a descent into the very recesses of mental anguish.

Artifact 5 mines the topic for some memorable and disturbing moments. The workmanlike halls of the hospital in which Elena rests stretch on like an increasingly frustrating maze, while some sequences have you endlessly walking through the couple’s apartment to hammer home the vicious cycle that poor mental health can lock you in. Flies fester, garbage piles up, lights drip and the wind howls. It’s literally stepping into the state of someone at their lowest.

Recurrence is, ironically, a recurrent theme within the game itself and perhaps a little too much at times. Some sequences stretch on a little too long without having much to say, and what impact they can make is diminished by frequent returns. This is a story that’s at its best when it encapsulates the strain of depression in ways that only gaming can express, by literally transporting you into someone’s mind and playing with the supernatural, so it’s a shame the ideas can’t stay fresh even for 60 minutes.

That said, there are moments that will stay with me, more for how cleverly that define the difficult juggling act of staying positive. At one point the music that Elena thrived upon appears to completely swallow her whole, which Tyler’s struggle with alcoholism is brought to life in one particularly visceral scene. Earlier moments in the game have happier sequences too, like exploring a world Elena builds with her music.

One of Anamorphine biggest missteps, though, is with its ending. Without spoiling anything, it’s important to note there are two possible conclusions to the game, and it’s very easy to miss the action needed to achieve the ‘good’ ending. I did the first time and, as a result, the game really rubbed me the wrong way. It simply didn’t have an ascent to

I remember the first time I flew by myself, I was terrified. And the funny thing? It wasn’t about the flying, it was about the airport. I was paranoid that I wouldn’t know where to go, wouldn’t be let past security, wouldn’t be allowed onto my flight and be stuck in some strange, alien world I knew nothing about. And that’s not uncommon; I’ve met lots of people that have had similar experiences. That’s what makes the Oculus Start-backed Flight VR so intriguing.

Current in development as a collaboration between VR architectural visualisation company, Visual Lane, and art studio, Chris Bain Design, Flight is a photorealistic experience designed for people that have a fear of flying. It offers a meticulous recreation of an airport and recreates the many processes passengers have to go through before and during boarding as a means of helping people get to grips with it. No detail has been spared, right down to safety instructions displaying on a passenger’s in-flight screen before takeoff.

Flight VR Experience from chrisbaindesign on Vimeo.

“VR is a perfect tool for releaving someone of the acute anxieties caused by flying,” Chris Bain himself told Upload over email. “Traditional exposure therapy can be distressing to the patient and cause even more extreme symtoms such as panic attacks and vomiting. Flight VR allows the user in enter a photorealistic 360 environment and experience air travel procedures, at their own pace, in the comfort of their own surroundings.”

As you can see in the trailer, the experience covers everything from arriving at an airport and checking your flight times to checking your luggage is the correct size for travel and passing through security gates. Eventually, you’ll board an aircraft, find your seat, stow your luggage and prepare to take off. Helpful hints appear along the way to give you as stress-free an experience as possible.

“It’s important the user has exposure to the full flying experience and part of that involves the journey through the airport/security/boarding and the sights and sounds of the airport,” Bain explained. “Many passengers with flying phobias don’t even make it to the aircraft jetway and our Flight VR allows the user to slowly build up the courage and relieve those anxieties.”

There are plenty of VR apps that utilize exposure therapy right now, but Flight easily looks like one of the most polished and intriguing we’ve yet seen.

Right now Flight VR is being developed as part of the Oculus Start program, which is designed to help smaller developers hit the ground running. Bain and co hope to turn an initial prototype into a full experience over the course of 2018, so hopefully we can get a deeper look towards the end of the year.

We’ve written a couple stories about the system which Kite & Lightning co-founder Cory Strassburger has been putting together mainly on his weekends. Strassburger uses a helmet-mounted iPhone X combined with an Xsens suit for completely wireless full body and facial motion capture. His latest additions smooth out the process even further and, with the Ikinema LiveAction tool, a performance can be brought directly into Unreal Engine in real-time.

“With the facial capture data being only 150kbps, you could easily have a mobile companion app for your game that allows an MC or Commentator to stream their audio and facial capture performance right into a live VR match,” Strassburger explained in an email.

Kite & Lightning is a small studio that developed VR experiences like Senza Peso as early as 2014 to show some very early adopters a true sense of immersion for the first time. Strassburger and co-founder Ikrima Elhassan also sharpened their skills with some work-for-hire VR projects before raising $2.5 million in 2016 with plans to build a game with an unusual premise. In Bebylon, immortal “bebies” regularly do battle in a character-driven VR spectacle.

Strassburger’s iPhone-based capture pipeline relies on face-sensing capabilities to transform his expressions into one of these bebies in real-time. Overall, it shows the potential of using one of Apple’s newest gadgets for decent motion capture at a relatively low all-in price. Strassburger explained in an email earlier this year how this possibility affected their roadmap.

“Having any meaningful amounts of character animation on our game’s early roadmap was a total pipe dream. I knew full well how slow and expensive it was to capture decent facial performances let alone the cost and time involved in simply building the facial rig for a character,” Strassburger wrote. “If Ikrima and I actually had a conversation early on, we would have both logically agreed that a handful of facial expressions would be all we need or could even entertain given the scope of our game. Luckily that conversation never happened because it went without saying! And as the concept for the game started to take shape and the Bebylon world was being born, so was this underlying, powerful desire to see these characters walk and smack talk and tell their stories to the public! The more I started to create and write about these characters, the more their existence became pivotal to the game’s concept of inspiring players to unleash their inner wild child within this crazy virtual game world.”

Capturing performances this way also opens the door to more easily making vignettes, TV shows, movies or other types of productions with the same core content and tools. These tools might not be up to the quality some creators need for their projects, but for those that do find this to be a good enough solution “it would definitely change the scape of creating content for those mediums because it is insanely easy to capture lots

First you saved serious cash on buying an Oculus Go headset instead of those pricey Rift thingies, and now you’re getting free content for one of the kit’s biggest games. Lucky you!

Coatsink’s frantic minigame compliation, They Suspect Nothing, will recieve a free update named Overclocked on Friday, Agust 3rd, which adds in eight new experiences for players to test their skills against. These games will be split across two new hub worlds added to the game’s robotic city in which humans are strictly banned. These include Arcadia University and the morbidly named Terminal Park. There’s also some extra items to customize your fake-robo character with.

“The Arcadia City University opens in the campus’ main foyer, a lavish hall filled with robot artifacts and the remnants of a student party,” Coatsink explained to UploadVR. “Unlike previous mini-games (in which the player struggled to prove they’re a robot), here the player must cheat their way through a series of exams to gain their ACU diploma, aided by their new best friend Terrence… a human disguised as a fridge.

“Meanwhile, Terminal Park is a vibrant funfair run by the extravagant fortune teller Voltar and her jaded crystal ball. Despite the wealth of workers (including a littering robot designed to make the place feel ‘authentic’) the player is officially the park’s first visitor. As Voltar says, “There are no tests here. No traps or tricks. Just pure unfettered amusement – built solely, it seems, for you.”

On top of the DLC, the game’s soundtrack will also go live on Spofity, iTunes and Amazon music.

They Suspect Nothing now boasts 20 minigames. It’s an experience that fits in with the core value of the Oculus Go itself; to get people into VR with accessible, engaging hardware and software. That is to say, it might not be the game for hardcore VR gamers, but it’s great for showing off your shiny new VR gear to friends and family. It’s available on both Go and Gear VR for $7.99/£5.99.

Eager to see more of upcoming PlayStation VR (PSVR) shooter, Blood And Truth? This new video has some tantalizing gameplay snippets.

Shot at last month’s E3, this footage from PlayStation sees developer Sony London discussing the making of its latest VR game with another studio, Flavourworks, which is currently making a title for PS4’s PlayLink platform. London’s Stuart Whyte talks about the challenges of making a VR shooter and delivering a story in a world in which the player has complete agency, and there’s some interesting comparisons between that and making Flavourworks’ smartphone-based adventure, Erica.

Perhaps most interesting is that Whyte reveals London Heist, the story-driven shooter minigame found on London Studio’s PlayStation VR Worlds, was “by far the most popular experience” found in that compilation. Blood And Truth is considered to be a spiritual successor to that experience, retaining the same look and feel though not necessarily starring the same characters. The aim, essentially, is to turn the London Heist demo into a full game.

Gameplay-wise, this clip shows us some new areas of the game that were being shown at E3. You take to the streets of London for gritty shootouts using the PlayStation Move controllers, and we also see players using construction sites to climb and take cover. We still don’t know when the game’s expected to hit, nor if it’s going to support PSVR’s shiny Aim controller, which seems perfectly suited to the experience.

Indie sensation Beat Saber is now officially supporting VR arcades with a commercial license. This means VR arcades can officially start carrying the rhythm slicing game through an agreement with its creators.

Distribution platform SpringboardVR is one of the first partners to get official access to Beat Saber for arcades. While the arcade roll-out is much larger than one single distribution partner, SpringboardVR operates at hundreds of locations around the world and co-founder Will Stackable said they “tracked” four million minutes of usage across their network in June. Those are interesting numbers to take note of as one of VR’s most exciting games comes to neighborhood arcade locations around the world.

“I think it has the potential to transform the VR Arcade space,” Stackable wrote. “I wouldn’t be surprised if it jumped to a top 10 slot and accounted for 5-10% of our total minutes the first month, which would be between 200k-400k minutes. (A number that would put it in good company with other top titles).”

Stackable offered up several reasons he’s excited to see what Beat Saber’s release in arcades does to shape the VR industry.

1.) It’s A Fun Game

The VOID draws in people with Star Wars while Dave & Buster’s just launched an alluring Jurassic World VR attraction. For VR arcades, Beat Saber might be just the thing to draw people into repeat visits. If the game turns out to be a compelling enough title to transform the scale of SpringboardVR’s business then it will likely also remake the larger VR arcade industry as well.

“Beat Saber is, put plainly, a truly high quality game,” Stackable wrote. “And just as importantly it’s the first quality game that is specifically made for arcade play. VR Arcades are used to taking consumer games and trying to fit them into an arcade play style. This game changes that.”

2.) Beat Saber Looks Incredible On Camera

Springboard is planning to partner with LIV and Virtual Athletics League to host a VR Arcade Tournament at more than 50 arcades with mixed reality broadcasting to show spectators what the game looks like.

“It’s the first VR game that looks as fun to play as it actually is to put on a headset and play,” Stackable wrote. “Mixed reality videos of Beat Saber are blowing up the internet… and we haven’t really seen that yet in VR. VR Arcades (and VR as a whole) desperately needs that. We need a game that people watch a video of on Facebook and say, ‘I NEED TO PLAY THAT!’ Beat Saber is a marketing teams dream game.”

3.) Per Minute Pricing

According to Stackable, SpringboardVR recommended the team behind Beat Saber price their commercial license around 6 cents per minute — a rate Stackable says is emerging as an industry norm.

“This is based partially on what operators are realizing makes sense for them financially,” Stackable wrote. “With their margins, spending approximately 15% of their revenue on commercial licensing makes sense. Above that and it gets tricky. So at $25 an hour, that comes out to $.06.

Farmers Insurance scales training with virtual reality In the insurance industry, training claims adjusters is a non-stop challenge. These public-facing employees work with clients in stressful situations, and their expertise is essential to giving customers the service they expect while ensuring efficienc...

The verdict is in: Hellblade VR is a triumph. Ninja Theory’s BAFTA-winning adventure was already worth your time on a flat screen, but it soars in VR and is simply unmissable if you own an Oculus Rift or HTC Vive. Good news, then: you can currently pick it up for almost half the price.

The original version of Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice is on sale on the Humble Store for the next week priced at $17.99/£14.99. That’s 40% off of the original price of $29.99/£24.99. Crucially, you can claim the game on Steam, meaning you’ll still get the free VR update when it goes live later today.

We loved what Ninja Theory did with Hellblade VR, calling it a “remarkable achievement in visual and sound design.”

“It’s a great example of how to port a non-VR third-person action game to the immersive realm of HMDs that not only stays true to the source material, but enhances the experience in meaningful ways,” Games Editor David Jagneaux wrote. “If you haven’t played Hellblade before, there is no better time than now and if you have, then this is an engrossing way to re-experience Senua’s journey from a new perspective.”

Elsewhere, Ninja Theory also confirmed that anyone that picked the game up on GOG instead of Steam will also be getting the VR version free. Yay!

I remember the moment that I realized playing a game like Hellblade in VR would be unlike everything else I’ve played before. During a tense fight with an enemy early on in the game I was very low on health. One of the voices in my head that’s constantly taunting, nagging, and whispering to Senua throughout her journey yelped “Behind you!” and I physically spun my head around to see another enemy lunging with a sword, so I pressed the block button and parried the blow perfectly. Had it not been for that ability to turn and look — and my instinct to follow directions from the voice in my head — I likely would have died.

Small moments like that are great examples of how VR can be used to enhance an otherwise non-VR game. Not every game needs VR support, but most games would be more immersive and engrossing if it was done well. Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice outside of VR was already one of the best games this entire generation with ominous psychological overtones and a highly atmospheric setting, so adapting that world to VR only enhances what already made it so great to begin with.

In Hellblade you take on the role of Senua as she descends into the depths of Nordic Hell, otherwise known as Helheim, on a quest to save the soul of her lost lover. Throughout the adventure you’re besieged by twisted, demonic creatures that engage you in ferocious melee combat. The journey consists of battling back these deranged creatures, exploring dark, twisted worlds, and uncovering the meaning behind cryptic symbols and puzzles.

What underscores everything though is the bold and brilliant presentation. Visually it’s one of the most stunning games (VR or otherwise) that I’ve ever played and I’m honestly hard-pressed to think of a better looking experience inside of a VR headset. The sound design is second-to-none as voices race through Senua’s head and across each of your ears. One voice may whisper words of encouragement while another sneers insults and discredits your actions. Flickers of images and brief hallucinations appear on-screen and you’re constantly questioning everything that you do and see for the entire 6-8 hour journey.

Combat in Hellblade is thrilling and intense. It’s nowhere near as deep as other third-person action games you may have played recently, but it doesn’t need to be. Senua can issue light and heavy attacks, dodge, block, and parry. Eventually you unlock some otherworldly abilities and time manipulation, which looks amazing in VR, but that’s the gist of it. You time your blocks to parry attacks, string together combos, and juggle multiple enemies that quickly try to surround and overwhelm you.

Being able to crane your neck around and marvel at the amazing environment is a huge reason why playing Hellblade in VR is so magical, but the change of perspective actually helps out combat as well. As explained at the start of this review, you can look around while fighting to avoid getting flanked by unseen enemies.

Update: After publication we received the following comment from a Google Advanced Technology and Projects (ATAP) spokesperson:

“ATAP is at the intersection of science and application where our goal is to solve significant problems and close the gap between what if and what is. We’re super excited about Richard joining the senior team and look forward to his contributions.”

Original: According to a report from VentureBeat, Richard Marks, a former senior researcher and head of PlayStation’s Magic Lab who helped create the PlayStation VR (PSVR) headset and PS Move controllers, has left Sony to join Google.

As of now we’ve got no real idea what his role at Google will be or what this means for the future of Sony’s PSVR. In fact, Google recently hired Phil Harrison, the former head of Sony’s game research and development for worldwide studios, Jack Buser, the former PlayStation Home chief, and even the creator of Xbox Live Arcade, Greg Canessa.

Clearly it seems that Google is amidst a big push for game-focused talent and is likely building up to something huge. There have been rumors of a “Google Yeti” which could be a cloud-based gaming platform to rival PlayStation and Xbox. If the Yeti were going to have VR features, hiring Marks would be a great way to prototype and engineer that sort of support.

While running Sony’s Magic Lab, Marks was in charge of R&D of future-focused concepts and ideas. In that role he helped create the PS Move controllers and PSVR headset as we mentioned, as well as the EyeToy (the predecessor of the PS Camera).

The biggest video-sharing platform in the world arrives on the Gear VR with all new features and content. Already a dominant application on the HTC Vive, PlayStation VR and Google Daydream platforms, Google’s immensely popular YouTube VR experience is now available on the Samsung Gear VR. The long-awaited app is a welcomed sight for Gear

Tomorrow, Hellblade’s official VR support releases (for free to all current and future owners of the base game) on Steam for Rift and Vive. It requires a beefy PC to run and we’re checking it out live right here pre-release today on our livestream. Having played the non-VR game a year ago when it first released, I’m extremely excited to see this support revealed.

In Hellblade you take on the role of Senua on a harrowing Celtic journey into Viking Hell to fight for the soul of a lost lover. Through the adventure you battle demons of the physical, mental, and illusory variety as voices, hallucinations, and more see you stumble deep into madness. Hellblade was already one of the most immersive and atmospheric games ever made and VR really amps that up even more.

We’ll be livestreaming Hellblade VR on PC today using an Oculus Rift with a PS4 controller plugged into the PC starting very soon as of the time this is being published (which means we’ll start at approximately 12:00 PM PT) and aim to last for about an hour or so. We’ll be livestreaming directly to the UploadVR Facebook page. You can see the full stream embedded right here down below once it’s up:

Hellblade VR Livestream

Hellblade gets full VR support tomorrow and we're playing it a day early! This is a full VR version of Ninja Theory's award-winning psychological thriller action game.Read our full review at UploadVR.com soon!

Posted by UploadVR on Monday, July 30, 2018

You can see our archived streams all in this one handy Livestream playlist over on the official UploadVR YouTube channel (which you should totally subscribe to by the way). All future and current streams will be on Facebook, which you can see a list of here.

Let us know which games you want us to livestream next and what you want to see us do, specifically, in Hellblade VR or other VR games. Comment with feedback down below!

Jeff Minter has made great games for decades, but his reboot of Atari’s 1980 arcade game Tempest made him an international icon — and gave Atari a killer app for the “64-bit” Jaguar console. Now that Atari itself is rebooting, Minter has returned to give the company a crown jewel in the form of Tempest 4000, a more intense sequel to Tempest 2000 and its spiritual successors.

Speaking with GamesBeat, Minter addressed some of the biggest questions gamers have had about Tempest 4000: Is a VR mode coming? What’s going on under the game’s hood? How do you get past the most difficult levels? And what’s the deal with all those Indian food, KLF, and livestock references in the game?

Here’s an edited transcript of our interview.

GamesBeat: PlayStation VR gamers were expecting Tempest 4000 to have a VR mode, and if any game would make great use of VR, this is it. What happened, and might you include PSVR support in a post-release patch?

Jeff Minter: We had VR working in our prototype, and yes, it does look amazing in VR. Getting everything fully working and certified in VR adds a fair bit to the development time; there’s a whole separate section of certification you have to go through on top of the already rigorous QA process before you can release on PSVR.

The powers that be wanted us to concentrate on producing a game that was consistent across all three platforms, and localized across six different languages, so that ended up displacing the completion of the VR mode.

I would like to add it back in if we get the chance, because it was spectacular and ran at 120Hz and 2x supersampling, as all our PSVR work does.

GamesBeat: Tempest was originally developed around a rotary controller. How did you adjust the controls for the analog joysticks most players are using now?

Minter: Analog sticks are halfway there already; the rotary controller allowed proportional control of speed along a single axis, and analog sticks already give you proportional control of speed, on two axes if necessary.

What the rotary controller had, and analog sticks lack, is a degree of physical inertia which affects how it feels to move the player ship. Of course we can’t add physical inertia to the analog sticks, but there is code that adds a little bit of programmed inertia to the control inputs to try and give something of a similar feel.

GamesBeat: Some of Tempest 4000’s stages are brutally difficult by design (including Destroyer), in part because you can only restart with a single life. Do you have any pointers or cheats for players who might get stuck along the way?

Minter: Ah, perhaps you are not taking best advantage of the way the Restart Best mechanic works. The idea is that when you reach a level, your lives and score are compared with the best yet achieved on that level, and if they are better they are saved, and on subsequent games you can start that level with the best lives and score you ever had upon